My Home Ideas

Special Offers

Be the first to know about This Old House contests, sweepstakes, and events and receive special offers and promotions from your favorite home improvement brands. We'll even send you regular reminders to enter our sweepstakes.

If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Trying to get 3 layers of paint from concrete garage floor

Just bought a 25 year old house. Previous owner has 3 layers of paint on the concrete garage floor. Have been scraping up with paint striper brush attached to drill, a metal pole sc****r. It's tough to get up. What would be the best way/product to get the 3 layers of paint up where it's just the concrete?

Re: Trying to get 3 layers of paint from concrete garage floor

aroundthe bend,

You have a couple choices: You can use a chemical stripper, or you can rent a floor grinder. The floor grinder looks like a floor buffer but has diamond stones where the buffing brushes would normally be. These are often used by commercial outfits that do 2 part epoxy garage floor coatings. The bonus to the grinding is that the abraided floor that results will give better adhesion to the new paint or epoxy.

If you just want to return to bare concrete, the chemical stripper will remove the paint without roughening the concrete.

Re: Trying to get 3 layers of paint from concrete garage floor

A two-part epoxy floor paint has the best chance of holding if the surface is abraided. The one thing that might interfer with adhesion is too much moisture coming up through the concrete. To test for moisture, place a piece of plastic, such as a garbage bag, on the floor taped on all sides. After 24 hours, remove the plastic and look for moisture on it. If there is a lot of moisture, better not paint.

The guys who do garage floors professionally will not guarantee the finish if moisture is present. They might still do it with a hold harmless agreement.